


Midnight Run

by mahoni



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: 1000-5000 Words, Action/Adventure, Gen, Team
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-09-26
Updated: 2008-09-26
Packaged: 2017-10-03 10:20:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,143
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16971
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mahoni/pseuds/mahoni
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This would not go down as one of their more successful missions.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Midnight Run

Teyla dropped down into the narrow trench around the hut, wincing at the brief shower of crumbling stone and plaster that followed her. The Lagan had given up their active search for herself and John some time ago and there were no sentries in this section of the settlement, but she did not like to take chances.

The trench was a bit deeper than her height but the moon was bright, so she hunched a little as she felt her way around to the nearest window, tugging the long, hooded Lagan tunic off as she went. She bundled the tunic up with the other one under her arm and swung her legs over the windowsill, slipping inside.

Her timing was very good. She sensed rather than saw the flicker of movement in the darkness and dropped the tunics, holding her hands out away from her body.

"John," she said. "It's me."

She heard the safety click on his handgun.

"Jeez, Teyla."

She dug her small flashlight from her vest pocket and switched it on.

John held up a hand to shield his eyes from its soft glow. He was slouched against the wall, not far from the pile of furniture and old clothing she had used to hide him earlier when he was still unconscious. She moved quietly to his side and knelt.

"Where the hell have you been?" he said. His voice was not slurring; that was good, at least. "Last thing I remember we were running to the gate. I got hit by a couple of blow darts." He waved a hand sluggishly at the room. "I woke up here...I didn't know if you'd gotten away, if you'd been caught. How the hell I got here."

He wasn't slurring, but she could still hear vagueness in his words that did not inspire optimism.

"I brought you here. You have been unconscious for hours."

He peered at her through the darkness for a moment, and then scrubbed a hand over his face. "Great. I don't suppose it was long enough for Atlantis to dial up looking for us and then send back-up?"

"No."

"And Ronon and Rodney?"

She nodded. "That is where I have been. They are safe for now. Relatively. The Lagan have chained them up in the town center. Both were still unconscious a short while ago, but they appeared otherwise unharmed."

John shook his head. "You know, I always wondered why nobody ever came after us for the whole waking the entire Wraith race thing. Especially after the Lanteans who borrowed Atlantis sent your people away -- I figured it had to have gotten around."

"Well -- do you think you can stand?" She helped him to his feet, propping him up when he sagged a little at first. She wanted to get him moving, get his blood flowing and his muscles woken up. He needed to be able to function on his own sooner rather than later. "I think that most people would understand that the Wraith would have continued to prey on humans regardless of whether they were all awake or just a few were. And most people could be made to see that your people have done more in just a few years to effectively decimate the Wraith's numbers than any of us have ever managed on our own in thousands of years."

"Is that how you feel about it?" he asked.

"That is how I have always felt about it," she said firmly.

That was not entirely true. She had had her doubts at times, had moments of resentment. But as far as it mattered, she really did feel that way.

"I'm glad," he said, quietly. He started to say something else, hesitated; then said, "Poor Ronon. He wasn't even around for any of that and he's still getting shafted."

"Guilty by association," she said. "Isn't that how your people say it?"

They were silent for a while, Teyla leading John in a careful circuit of the room, following a path through the rubbish picked out by her small light. They'd gone around a few times when John said,

"Okay, now, why are we walking in circles around the room?"

His voice sounded stronger, and he'd finally regained enough clarity of thought to ask that question.

"Clearing your head," she said. "Working the drug out of your system. You need to be well enough to make it to the Stargate on your own."

John lurched suddenly to a stop, making them both stumble. "On my -- now, wait just a damn minute, Teyla."

She started moving again, dragging him ruthlessly forward; he clung to her and, as expected, had to momentarily stop talking in order to concentrate on not falling down.

"Please listen before you argue," she said. She wondered what he would say if he knew that she had frequently used this same tone with Jinto and Wex and other children when they were being obstinate. "You can barely walk. Ronon and Rodney will be in a similar condition once they are freed, and it will be easier for me to manage the two of them than three of you. And -- " she continued sharply as he started to object. "More importantly, it will be easier for us all to escape if you are waiting at the Stargate with the guards already subdued and the gate dialed."

They shuffled another half circuit of the room in silence before John blew out a frustrated breath. "Okay. I will not deny you make good points. But -- "

"And," she interrupted smoothly. "If something goes wrong you will be in a position to immediately summon help." That was assuming he did in fact make it to the gate safely and was not captured, but she didn't say that out loud.

She didn't like the idea of sending John out alone when he would still be weak from the drug, but the risk had to be taken. The Lagan preferred to punish criminals by leaving them out in the unforgiving sun to suffer -- and usually die of -- the heat, but she knew they believed that the ends were more important than the means. She was afraid that if she and John both went back to the Stargate and simply called for help, the activation of the gate would warn the Lagan and by the time help arrived Rodney and Ronon would be dead.

She glanced at her watch. Midnight was a few hours gone, and the Lagan would be rousing to start their day soon. She wanted to get to the town center with time to spare.

"How do you feel?" she said.

John stopped and let go of her, pushing away slightly. He remained upright, and managed to stagger a few steps forward without falling, too.

"I'll make it," he said. "So, keeping in mind that I already don't like it, what's your plan?"

*

Once she got John out of the little house and pointed him in the direction of the Stargate, she headed for the town center. The moon, a planetoid that hung huge and pockmarked in the sky, gave off plenty of light, while the wide stone pillars that created shady avenues along the town streets created pockets of shadow for them both to use as they made their way to their respective destinations.

The Lagan would no doubt be using the shadows as well, but Teyla and John were both wearing one of the long, hooded tunics she had stolen. They had both decided to risk keeping their weapons hidden beneath the tunics; they'd be noticeable as non-members of the little community from close up, but hoped that with nothing overt to mark them as off-worlders, the tunics would make adequate camouflage in the dim light of the setting moon.

As she wound her way through the maze of pillars, she had to make an effort to focus her full attention on her surroundings. When they had parted, John had not been entirely steady on his feet yet, and his reaction time was still noticeably slower. He had a knack for this sort of thing, for hunting, stalking, moving about unseen. But if his body decided not to cooperate at a critical moment, his natural skill would mean nothing. She kept waiting to hear shouting, or gunfire -- some indication that he had been spotted.

_You need to get to Ronon and Rodney,_ she told herself. _John is on his own, whatever happens will happen. It had to be done this way. Focus._

And as if to reinforce this, movement out of the corner of her eye resolved into a Lagan sentry beside a crumbling pillar. He stepped out just far enough to be seen, and she gave him the all clear signal she had seen the sentries exchange when she was scouting earlier. He nodded and faded back into the darkness as she continued on. She made a mental note of his location; he would need to be either dealt with or avoided on the way back to the gate.

The portion of the town nearest the Stargate was mostly abandoned. When all able-bodied adults from a home were culled, any children or elderly were taken to live with others and the home was left to decay. The homes, with all of the things that had belonged to the taken, were considered tombs, monuments to the dead where no bodies were left to be buried. The occupied part of the town tended to migrate over time, winding its way deeper into the wasteland away from the Stargate as waves of Wraith came and took their fill.

Even at night, even before the townspeople were up and moving about, it was impossible to mistake the moment one stepped from the graveyard of homes into the occupied town. Suddenly the walkways were tidy, the pillars plastered and decorated, and the roofs of the sunken mud brick huts were white-washed and well-kept.

It wasn't far now to the plaza at the center of the town. She took a spiraling path in, quickly and quietly immobilizing the sentries tucked into the alleys and avenues nearest the plaza and along her intended escape route. One of them had Ronon's gun, which she reappropriated and tucked away beneath her tunic. The last one she took out was the one within sight of the platform where Ronon and Rodney stood bound to wooden posts; this one almost got away from her. The brief struggle would have alerted any sentries nearby if she hadn't already taken care of them.

This one also had the key to Ronon and Rodney's chains. Once she had him subdued and the key in hand, she lifted herself silently onto the platform. The two men were chained to the middle posts; the posts on either end waited for herself and John.

Neither Ronon nor Rodney had moved as she approached. She swore under her breath. She had expected the paralyzing drug to have worn off by now, as it had with John. Maybe the Lagan had given them more?

"Rodney?" she whispered. "Ronon? Are you awake?"

Their heads shot up and she heard Rodney gasp.

"Teyla?" he hissed.

She shushed him and hurried forward with the key, a little dizzy with relief. Ronon, she saw, had already managed to pull one arm free of his chains, and he had been simply holding the hand above his head while they pretended to be unconscious. If she had looked closely she would have noticed.

Once their chains were off they both swayed drunkenly in place, rubbing their arms.

"Sheppard?" Ronon asked, so softly she almost couldn't hear him.

"Safe." She hoped. "Waiting at the Stargate." As far as she knew.

They moved to the edge of the platform; Ronon hopped down without waiting for her, and she had to lunge off the platform to catch him when he lost his balance and nearly crashed to the ground. Rodney took full advantage of her support, however, and she felt him trembling when he leaned on her.

"Okay?" she murmured when his feet were on the ground.

He nodded, exhaustion and fear evident in his face. "Yes, yes. Just...please tell me you know the way out of this place, because I have no idea where we are."

"I do."

She passed Ronon's gun to him. He looked pleased as he hefted it and checked the setting.

"Good," he muttered. "I'm in the mood to shoot somebody."

*

Progress was slow but steady. Rodney and Ronon had more trouble navigating the unkempt pathways of the abandoned part of the settlement, stumbling over ruts and rubble, but they managed quietly for the most part. Teyla scouted ahead, dealing with any sentries she found. They made it nearly to the Stargate with no problems.

She had never been one to assume good luck would hold, however, so when she turned a corner and found herself facing half a dozen armed Lagan sharing a wineskin she was not taken by surprise.

Two of them were in the dirt before they realized who she was. A few more charged her and went down relatively easily as well. However, the last was also the smartest -- he turned and ran as soon as he saw the direction the fight was headed.

Teyla let him go and waved Ronon and Rodney forward.

"He will sound the alarm," she said, not bothering to whisper any more. "We must hurry."

They picked up the pace as much as they could. Shouts rose up around them, a few very close by. They passed through an old plaza, circling the mound of stone that had once been a covered well; only a few more avenues to cross and they would be at the gate.

Teyla tagged on her communicator and said, "John, we are close."

To her relief his answer was immediate. "About time."

From not too far ahead, the sound of gunfire erupted. The noise almost masked the sound of approaching footsteps; she spun just in time, firing at the ground in front of the group of Lagan that came out of the darkness behind them. They yelled and stumbled back.

And then they were out of the settlement, out of the nominal protection of the maze of pillars and hurrying across the hard packed stretch of desert toward the Stargate. Teyla saw the burst of watery brilliance as it engaged, and saw John silhouetted against it, shouting and waving them on.

They made it to the DHD, raced past it, and no one fell as they ran. Then they were only a few feet from the gate, and relief flooded through her.

She heard Rodney wheeze, "Oh, thank god," and then a Lagan man stepped out from behind the gate and raised a blowgun to his mouth.

Ronon dropped him with a shot, and the four of them ducked through the gate.

They stumbled to a messy stop in the gate room as the Stargate winked out behind them. John signaled to the Marines on gate duty to stand down. Teyla, Ronon and Rodney were all breathing heavily; Rodney staggered to the stairs and dropped down on them while Ronon simply sat down where he was and let himself flop onto his back.

John was swaying where he stood as he said, "Well. That was fun."

"Hah," Rodney said, and then gave up on trying to say more. That was probably for the best, because Rodney was also swaying, even though he was lying down.

"Hey, Teyla?"

She turned to Ronon, who had sat up. He looked concerned. Perhaps because the whole room was swaying?

She felt the pinch on her arm just below the shoulder almost as an afterthought. She reached around and tugged out the dart, and sighed.

"Ah," she said resignedly, because the drug worked very fast, and, the swaying room, and, her vision was already blurring, around --

*

Teyla floated down out of sleep. It was a distinctly unpleasant feeling, as if she had grown weightless and would at any point tumble away out of control if she didn't wake up immediately.

She gasped awake, and then had to shut her eyes as the room shimmered and wobbled and nausea rolled through her.

"Sucks, doesn't it."

She let her head fall to the side and squinted her eyes open. John was sitting in a chair by her bed, slouched so deeply in it he looked as if he would slide to the floor if he so much as breathed.

His expression was sympathetic. "I hate to tell you this, but you've got hours of feeling floaty and disconnected and like you want to throw up ahead of you. And then later, when that wears off, everything will ache and your muscles will start twitching and stuff."

She grimaced. "Wonderful." It sounded like 'wunnerful.'

"Yep. And to think you were _this close_ to making it off that planet without sharing the bad drugs with us."

Her gaze drifted past him; Ronon was stretched out flat on his back in the next bed over, snoring loudly. The hand he had scraped up getting loose from the shackle was neatly bandaged, resting on his stomach.

"Rodney's on the other side of you," John said, so she looked over there, too. Sure enough. There he was.

"We're _all_ supposed to be in bed, actually," Rodney said, shooting a quick, pointed look at Sheppard. He had his PDA and if his expression and the violence and rapidity with which he was jabbing at the tiny keypad were any indication he was most likely having a text message argument with Doctor Zelenka.

"If I recall, Rodney, Keller told us that we needed to rest. I don't think that a two hour non-stop wireless argument with Zelenka constitutes 'rest'."

"Yeah, well, I'd like to see you try to rest when your subordinates are threatening the fabric of space and time with their completely moronic theories of zero point energy," Rodney muttered, and continued abusing the tiny machine.

John squeezed her arm, so she looked back at him.

"I just wanted to make sure you were okay," he said.

She smiled. "We are all safe. This will pass. I am fine."

He smiled back, and stood. "Thanks for getting us all off that planet alive, by the way."

She attempted to wave him off but her hand did not cooperate, so she settled for more smiling and nodding. She reflected that she was very, very glad she didn't have to do anything like stand around chained to a post or sneak through a dark, broken-down village settlement feeling like this.

John shook his head and grinned ruefully at her.

"Just...sleep it off. You'll feel better later."

She watched him go around Ronon and climb into the rumpled bed on the other side. Then she closed her eyes and slept.

*


End file.
